Turner recently returned to action having spent six months out after suffering a recurrence of the knee injury he sustained when he collided with a post in the draw with Everton last November.

In the absence of Titus Bramble, Turner has started the Black Cats last five Premier League games alongside Brown and the Lewisham-born centre-back believes his partnership with the former Manchester United man is growing stronger.

"The partnership is slowly getting better and we're learning to play with each other," Turner said.

"We conceded a couple of early goals in the first few games which was obviously disappointing for the team but generally as a partnership we've grown over the weeks and I'm sure that if we continue playing together we'll get stronger.

"Wes has had a great career at Manchester United and he's won pretty much everything and all the lads have got huge respect for what he's done.

"For me personally it's obviously nice and a great feeling to play alongside someone like that who's achieved so many great things.

"Obviously he's changed his direction now having left Man United and he's got a new focus now so we're all learning together in this new environment."

Meanwhile, former Black Cats manager Ricky Sbragia has backed Craig Gordon to regain the number one jersey for both club and country when he returns to full fitness.

Gordon is yet to feature for the Wearsiders this season after undergoing a knee operation towards the end of last season but the 28-year-old has now returned to training and is expected to be in contention for a first-team place in a month's time.

With Simon Mignolet out for up to eight weeks with a fractured eye socket, Keiren Westwood has stepped into the number one spot for the Black Cats, but Sbragia, Scotland's Under-17 coach, believes Gordon is still the club's number one goalkeeper.

He said: "Craig has just been really unfortunate with injuries. I think he's back training now, but the injury to his arm has caused him a massive problem.

"I feel sorry for him because he's worked hard to get back in and for me he is still the Sunderland no 1 despite others stepping in.

"But he's missed a lot of football now, that's the biggest problem, I notice he's doing more on the telly now so I don't know what's he's thinking. I hope he's thinking he'll get back in again. Unfortunately he's not played for a year and he's had an injury, then an injury then another injury.

"When he does get fit he'll maybe have two, three, four years of good football in him. But the problem is getting back in.

"He's training now and he'll have pencilled in a couple of reserves games, no doubt about that. The financial things won't matter to Craig and he'll just want to play football."